LIFE AT SEA
This page will contain stories about life at sea, told by sailors who served aboard Four Stack destroyers. Some come from my father's ship, USS BARRY, and others have been sent to me by readers of this website. If you have an poignant experience or amusing anecdote about life aboard Four Stackers, send it to me, and I'll do my best to publish it here.
THE BARRY - SPRING, 1944
by Ward C. Timmons
Old U.S.S. BARRY,
APD 29
A resurected Tin Can,
She moans and she groans
Under her top-heavy frame,
It's hard to recognize her
By that famous old name.
You read her new number,
And new designation,
Taken by her motley crew
With slight jubilation
They like to remember
Old two-forty-eight
When she sailed the Caribbean,
The Mediterranean, thru' the Orient.
"Them were the days"
When a salor could ride
And jest with his buddies,
Maybe pitch one over the side,
Throw him a line,
And all get a laugh,
Lay over at Rio,
Champagne to quaff.
Crossing the Equator,
Oh Boy! That was fun,
The Shellbacks and the Pollywogs
On that never-to-be-forgotten run.
What a predicament - a Pollywog!
What a vengeance - a Shellback!
They know what they are
If ever they come back!
Yes, the U.S.S. BARRY,
Vintage of 1921,
Was a sea-going Mossback
By 1941
When the Japs hit Pearl Harbor,
We were damned tired of the Hun.
Whe took on her war paint;
Shootin' business was begun!
Patrols and escorts
All in the routine.
She asked for no favors;
Anywhere on the main
That old North Atlantic
Cold, foggy and frantic,
Too rugged for some,
To the BARRY, romantic
She wallowed, she rolled
In the wind with a woe,
But she never floundered,
She was ready to go.
Her game was the U-Boat
Her lust was to kill,
She was one Four-Stacker
That couldn't get her fill.
Her Sister-Ship, the BORIE,
And one like them, the Goff,
Only those three ith the CARD
In that cold desolate trough,
When they got 21 U-Boats,
A Presidential Citation.
The BORIE went down,
But with glory for the Nation.
Then down to Charleston,
For major repair,
To assume a new rold
To Amphibious Warfare
She had done her assignment
In DesLant Command.
The Bureau said the time
For fast transport was at hand.
Those Marines have to get there
On the beach with the foe.
The BARRY can take them
Where no transport can go
And she can return again
Ten times - and more!
Her crew is just itching
For a dirty Jap's shore.
But the BARRY's not choicy
Just any foe
In the sights of her guns.
All she wants to know -
That all the men on her
Are worthy of their Rates.
'Cause they're privileged to fight
For the United States.
This page, and all contents, are Copyright (C) 2000 by Kenn
Anderson,Sr., Scranton, PA. (USA)
